The Dutch parliament has passed a landmark resolution calling on the government to halt the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia, accusing the Gulf kingdom of "violating international humanitarian law" as a result of its military offensive in Yemen. The bill is the first of its kind to be passed by a European Union member state following developments in the EU parliament last month, [...]

According to a survey organized by Sputnik.Polls, about one third of American, Dutch, British, French, German and Italian people believe Crimea is part of Russia. The Sputnik Information Agency and Radio ordered the survey, which was conducted by the Populus research firm in the United States [...]

Riyadh has shot itself in the foot by adopting a predatory pricing policy in the oil market aimed at wiping its competitors out; now the House of Saud is reaping a whirlwind it sowed. Back in 2014 Saudi Arabia decided to drop oil prices in order to expel Russia from the European and Asian oil markets and at the same time to deal a heavy blow to the US shale oil industry. [...]

Russian President Vladimir Putin turned his attention to domestic issues on Tuesday, amid several high-profile arrests, in what could be seen as a shift away from foreign policy, which dominated his agenda for the past two years. Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), which answers directly to [...]

As Russia’s Vladimir Putin announced the start of the withdrawal of Russian forces from Syria, Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu has reported the anti-terror operation’s achievements to the Commander-in-Chief. "Backed by our aviation, Syrian forces have freed 400 populated areas and over 10,000 square kilometers [3,860 square miles] of territories," Shoigu said during a Kremlin meeting with R [...]

Global political figures have welcomed the Russian military pullout from Syria, and while many have called the Kremlin’s decision “unexpected,” it is seen as clearing the way for dialogue while a truce in the five-year-old war is negotiated in Geneva. Acknowledging that five months of military campaigns have mostly succeeded in their primary objective of eliminating the immediate wider th [...]

Kiev has announced a massive discount on the sale of state assets which have failed to find foreign buyers. Ukraine’s State Property Fund says all of the assets have been put up for sale more than 10 times and have found no takers. As a result, 22 of 34 state assets are now being put up for sale at a 60 percent discount, nine with a discount of 50 percent, and three are up for auction at a re [...]

Just when things were going smoothly for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the people started voting, and that’s when everyone began to notice that the wheels on her campaign car were wobbling. The former US Secretary of State began 2016 with $100 million in her campaign coffers: [...]

Bulk data gathering programs used by US intelligence have no effect in combating terrorism and have failed to prevent any attacks in their 10 years of operation, whistleblower and former NSA contactor Edward Snowden, claims in a recent interview. “In the wake of the revelations of mass surveillance the [US] president [Barack Obama] appointed two independent commissions to review the efficienc [...]

Controversial changes to the Polish Constitutional Tribunal brought in by the Law and Justice (PiS) party, following its election in October 2015, have been blasted as "crippling" and undermining the basic principles of democracy. A report by the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe — a separate body from the European Union founded in 1949 to protect democracy, human rights and the rule [...]

The United States doesn't want to see Chinese and Russian companies operating in Bolivia, and has instructed Washington-supported opposition forces to try and stop them, says Bolivian President Evo Morales, citing the recent scandal around China's CAMC Engineering Co, which managed to unfairly [...]

The launch of the first joint ESA-Roscosmos mission to the Red Planet serves partly as a response to the "stupid political" anti-Russian sanctions, according to Alexey Novikov, spokesman for the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos. In an interview with Sputnik, Alexey Novikov, spokesman for the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos, described the launch of the first joint ESA-Roscosmos miss [...]

An Islamic State fighter from the US was arrested in Iraq after emerging from territory controlled by the militant group in Syria, a local commander told Kurdish media. The man reportedly mistook the area for the Turkish border. A local commander told Kurdish news outlet Rudaw that the arrested man was 27-year-old Muhammad Jamal Amin, a Virginia-born US citizen of a Palestinian father and an Ir [...]

A group of Communist Party lawmakers is seeking to impose sanctions on US officials involved in the kidnapping and jailing of Russian pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko, proposing Hillary Clinton as the first candidate for the blacklist. In their letter, quoted by popular daily Izvestia on Monday, the MPs reminded that at the moment of Yaroshenko’s kidnapping, Hillary Clinton occupied the post of US [...]

Following her party's success in the German regional elections, the chairwoman of the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party told RT that the results were “even better” than anticipated, and that AfD is needed in the country. Official election results proved significant success for AfD, which received enough votes to get into three state legislatures. [...]

The US Justice Department cautioned local courts that it is unconstitutional to jail someone for not paying fines without determining whether they are able to pay, and warned against using court fees to generate revenue for cities. The warnings came as part of an effort to reform court practices that “perpetuate poverty and result in unnecessary deprivations of liberty,” the Justice Depar [...]

Stability used to define Germany's political system. But the refugee crisis has fundamentally changed the country's party landscape. The rise of the fringe has eroded the traditional centers of power. Seven or eight months ago, Germany was a different country than it is today. [...]

With her refugee policies, Chancellor Merkel has isolated Germany to a greater degree than any of her predecessors. The Balkan Route has been closed down against her will and many EU leaders believe her overtures to Turkey are delusional. There were times when interactions between the German [...]

Western media is ignoring what is really going on on the ground in Syria, presenting its own, largely distorted narrative, Canadian freelance journalist and rights activist Eva Bartlett notes. What lies beneath the attempts to hide the truth? For years US policy-makers have been repeating the mantra "Assad must go," turning a deaf ear to warnings that once Bashar al-Assad is toppled, [...]